


For Love

by Bookkbaby



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Coda, Fix-It, Fluff, M/M, Post-15.19
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-18
Updated: 2020-11-18
Packaged: 2021-03-09 23:06:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,164
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27613892
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bookkbaby/pseuds/Bookkbaby
Summary: Post 15x19.With Chuck no longer a threat, there's just one thing left to do: get Cas out of the Empty.
Relationships: Castiel/Dean Winchester
Comments: 14
Kudos: 437
Collections: SPN Finale "Destiel is CANON" Collection





	For Love

It's dark here. Darker than Dean had expected, even though Jack had _told him_ what it was like and the place was called 'The Empty'.

Nothing moves here. It's just a featureless black void as far as Dean can see, but he refuses to let that deter him. He'd known, more or less, what he was getting into when he begged Jack for a favor.

_"Jack... I know you said you were going to be hands-off, but please... he's gotta be the exception. Just this once."  
_

_Jack looks at him. Someone so young shouldn't have eyes that old and Dean feels a shiver run down his spine as those eyes glow an unearthly gold.  
_

_Then the glow fades and Jack shakes his head slowly. Dean's heart drops, his whole body suddenly feeling hollow as his hopes flicker and die.  
_

_"I can't," Jack says. He smiles cheerily at Dean. "But_ you _can."_

So Dean keeps walking. He can't see the ground beneath his feet, but he can feel it there, and he supposes it doesn't matter if he can see it or not. It's not like there's road signs in the Empty, or handy trail markers pointing the way.

What there _is_ is a tug in his gut, a sense of 'this way, this way'. Dean lets that feeling lead him and doesn't let himself think about what will happen if that tug isn't leading him where he wants to go. Where he _needs_ to go.

There's no way to mark the passage of time in the Empty; Dean honestly doubts time as a concept exists here at all. So he can't say exactly how long he's been walking when he suddenly stops, his heart tripping with the feeling of finding something lost and dearly missed.

Dean looks around. This part of the Empty is just as dark and featureless as the rest, but he _knows_. This is it.

He takes a deep breath.

"Cas?" he calls out. There's a soft echo of his voice reverberating off of walls Dean can't see, almost like an afterimage of sound. He clears his throat and tries again.

"Castiel," he says, louder this time, voice firmer. "Cas, I need you to hear me."

There's no response. Not yet, anyway, and Dean refuses to let himself think that there might never be.

"You told me once that you always come when I call," Dean said. He turns slowly, scanning the dark horizon for any trace of movement. "Well, I'm calling now."

Silence.

"There's a lot of things I never told you," Dean says. "There's a lot of things I should've said and a lot of things I said to you that I shouldn't. I know you told me in Purgatory that I didn't have to say it, that you'd heard me already, but Cas... I'm sorry."

Dean stops for a moment, hoping to hear a familiar flap of wings, or see a flash of tan coat, but nothing.

"I'm sorry for whatever it was I said that made you think- anything that made you feel unloved," Dean says. He can think of a shameful number of things he'd said that might fit the category, everything from "you can't stay" to "you're dead to me", and the guilt crawls up his throat again, almost choking off his words. "Because that's not true. I should have told you before, shouldn't just have assumed you knew and... and didn't want it."

Dean chuckles dryly and shakes his head.

"We've been a couple of dumbasses, haven't we," he says. It's not really a question. "I thought angels didn't love like humans, thought maybe you just _couldn't_ , but Cas... you are one of the most loving people I know. You love Jack, you love Sam, you... you love _me_."

Dean's voice drops, cracks on the last word.

"You love the whole world, down to the last goddamn _mosquito_ , and that's not because of me. That's because of you. You said everything I've done, I've done for love? Well, so have you."

Raising Dean from Hell might have been Heaven-mandated, but Dean had heard from Chuck's own mouth that nothing after had been. Dean might've been the catalyst for _this_ universe's Castiel to go full rebel, but the seeds had always been there.

Cas had gone through Hell, literally and figuratively, had died time and time again, and he had done it for the world, for _Dean_.

For love.

"I just need you to do one more thing, Cas. I need you to wake up, because the thing you wanted most, that you thought you could never have?"

Dean almost can't speak. When he does, the words come out as little more than a croak.

"You can, if you want. You can- _we_ can have this," Dean says. His heart jumps as he says the words out loud, pounding fit to burst from his chest.

They could have this, him and Cas. Cas and him. Them, _together_.

Dean had never dared let himself think about it. It had seemed too far out of reach, like a star shining brightly you wished upon every night but knew you would never touch.

"Just wake up," Dean says. He'd be ashamed of the pleading note in his voice if he wasn't so desperate for this to work.

For a long, long moment, there is silence.

And then.

It's nothing Dean can pinpoint. No sound of footsteps, no rustling of feathers. No hand on his shoulder.

But Dean knows.

He turns and Cas is standing there, not ten feet behind Dean. Dean watches as the inky blackness of the Empty pulls away from Cas in a reversal of that awful moment it had taken him.

Dean smiles.

"Hello, Cas," he says. Castiel's expression is naked hope and shock.

"Dean," he says. He steps forward then hesitates as though unsure of his welcome. Dean has no such compunctions.

He crosses the distance between them and pulls Cas in for a desperate hug, something hollow in his chest finally filling with Cas solid and warm in his arms. Cas startles, but he returns the hug just as desperately, clutching at Dean as though _Dean_ was the one with a habit of vanishing.

"Dean," Cas says again, and Dean can feel the sound in his chest, hear Cas's breath against his ear. "How... why...?"

Dean chuckles, giddy with success and anticipation. He pulls back just a little, just enough to look Cas in the eye when he speaks.

"Why do I do anything?" Dean asks. He reaches up and cups Cas's cheek with one hand, feeling the scratch of stubble against his palm and Cas's sharp inhale.

He waits, watching the hope in Cas's eyes grow brighter and feeling his own expression turn soft and warm, his heart written into an expression meant for only one person to see.

"For love," Cas whispers. There's a barely-there question in his voice.

"For love," Dean confirms, leaning closer.

He seals it with a kiss.


End file.
